The invention relates generally to speech recognition tools and, more particularly, to a speech recognition grammar (“SRG”) tool for facilitating the creation of grammars for speech recognition tools.
Speech recognition is a process of recognizing one or more words or phrases spoken by a user. A SRG provides a recognizer with information about the expected input. By knowing the structure of the expected input, a recognizer can narrow its choices and thus allow a wider range of voice quality and intonation to be correctly identified. The recognition is based on what the user says, as well as a vocabulary and, perhaps, a grammar. A grammar is a set of rules that limit the recognition tasks to a specific set of words and/or phrases. In an effort to improve recognition accuracy, a speech recognition tool, or “recognizer,” is typically advised as to which words and/or phrases (or word sequences) are valid in the application. Grammar rules vary between various recognizers; therefore, to develop a grammar for a particular recognizer, a developer is required to be familiar with the particular rules and syntax applied by the vendor of the particular recognizer. Accordingly, if a developer develops grammars for multiple recognizers, he or she must be familiar with multiple sets of rules and syntaxes.
Therefore, what is needed is a system and method for simplifying the development of grammars for multiple recognizers available from different vendors.